My Professor

apprehension

"Where is Jaejin?" he asked demurely.

"appa, listen to me ple-"

"WHERE IS HE!"

I froze not wanting to answer.

"hyung.." said a voice. Uncle and Jiwon had reached.

Dad looked at Jiwon with contempt. "You are?"

"I am Eun Jiwon. Sunmi's English professor." he replied.

"So you knew all along." he turned to me. I didn't dare to meet his eyes.

"Hyung-"

"Is he your friend.." he interrupted, "or boyfriend?" he scoffed.

After a brief silence Uncle said, "my husband."

I could feel dad raging and how hard he tried not to slap him. "Appa," I tugged at his sleeve.

"When are you leaving?" he asked me.

"tomorrow morning.."

"Eun Jiwon, right?"

Jiwon bowed nervously.

"Drop my daughter home safely. And you, Lee Jaijin. We need to talk."

"Appa please listen to me.."

"Sunmi-ya! Go back to your room now!"

Uncle whispered something to Jiwon who then said we should leave and gave my back a nudge. "But.....samcheon.." I protested and clung to my uncle. "I am so sorry it's all because of me... samcheon I am sorry..."

He patted my head, "Ya..you've not done anything wrong okay" he pulled away wiping my tears with the cuffs of his jacket. "Go now...I need to talk to appa right?"

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Jiwon and I returned to the hotel in silence. As we were about to part ways to go to our respective rooms, he asked, "he won't hurt Jaijin right?"

"I hope he doesn't," I replied. It made Jiwon feel restless but he headed to his room anyway.

How would you define hurting. If it meant physically, Dad won't hurt him. Emotionally, he already had. A lot. My Dad was always a good son, father, husband and even a doctor but he could never be a good brother. By his metric, he was the nice brother and uncle was the weird one. The wild one who had to be 'disciplined'. He never gave uncle a chance to just sit down and pour his heart out to him. They didn't hate each other of course but there was this constant competition between them to be better. Tbh, it was just one sided. Uncle didn't really care and Dad made sure to rub it in his face so he cares. My first glimpse of it was when I was in middle school and got into a fight.

I requested the teacher to call my uncle instead of mom or dad. Besides being afraid of dad's wrath, I didn't want to trouble him or mom at the hospital. Nevertheless, the teachers later informed dad about it. That night, I heard dad be all restless because I found it easier to approach uncle.

Dad got more distant the day he came to know that Uncle is into guys. It was sometime during his college years. Since then, he pretends to not know and makes sure that no topic about uncle's marriage ever comes up. Eomma figured it out but she has to pretend like she's too dumb to notice. If Dad could, he would live all his life in denial than let uncle live with another man.

Both Kangin and Suwon were fast asleep when I entered. I lay on my bed trying to shut out all the worst thoughts. It took quite some time but I managed to fall asleep.

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On the bus back home the next morning, I watched as Jiwon called uncle more than 15 times and sent him a total of around 40 messages since last night. I had called dad in the morning. He was still quite mad at me so I didn't dare to ask him anything. Since then, neither dad nor uncle answered any of our calls or messages.

"He will be okay right? Should I go back? Do you have the address where they're staying?"

"Samcheon, you will make it worse if you go back now and besides, we're already nearing Seoul."

"When will they return???"

"Monday afternoon,"

He sighed and turned towards the window. I turned to the isle where I noticed the back of Suwon's head four rows ahead. Last night was a complete mess. How am I going to face him in class? How am I going to ask him any doubts? How am I going to feel when I see him caring for Da-kyung like he did for me? Why did I have to take up Eco UGH!!